2 Internet Connections?

I have an internet connection going into my work but it is fairly unstable and still not fast enough for our needs.

If I was to get another adsl connection on another phone line then what would be the best way to load balance this? Is there a router I can run two internet connections off and load balance the two of them?

I have never heard of such a device. I would assume that the reason that you use the work connection is because it is a secure line into the work network. By adding another line and load-balancing you basically destroy this security.

If you are going to get another internet line, get something like cable or DSL of appropriate speed for surfing the internet / gaming and use that exclusively for internet stuff.

Switch over to the work line when you need to get work done. Windows XP can handle multiple network cards all you have to do is tell it which one to use at any specific time.

The gaming LAN set up at my biddies house, along with his neighbor in their respective garages have two cable modems running in tandem, through a load balancing router.

It works fairly well for the most part. There are some strange conectivity issue from time to time with constatn connection programs like ICQ, or MSN, constantly logging as the router decides to swithc which modem its going to balance your connection off of at which time.

So they finally ditched that and went to a linux box which load balances, and it works fantasticly. And does an excelent job of really boosting the speed. Which, through doing a DSLreports speed test, nets us an extra 1/3 of speed. And alot less bottle necking when we have 30+ people jammed in there on a game day.

I forget what brand their shitty router they had was, or id recemend you to steer clear of it. But i have heard good things about Linksys's load balancing router. So perhaps look into that.

Dude, you are Linksys' bitch, aren't you? Do they make a product you don't like?

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actually, if you search the forum for keyword "linksys" under posts I created, and you will find that 70% of the time I hate linksys. Unfortunatly, once cisco took over, they started making a lot of niche-specific products utilizing low-end linksys hardware, and were duplicating some of Cisco's higher-end software to run on the devices.

In this particular instance, it's perfect. Running a linux box with something such as Smoothwall is also an option, but simplicity and reliability drop down a lot, as where space and power utilization jump up considerably.

most ISPs don't let you choose random bandwidth caps... Charter, here, for example has a 3Mbps/256Kbps service... that's it. Don't like it? Tough luck. You want more, then time to talk bandwidth aggregation.

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I know that up here in WA, Comcast has a COmcast Business setup, which offers around 8-10mpbs, and virtually uncapped upload, so that you can run business level data apps without choking your connection to a crawl.

But, like you said, not everyone is set up to handle that sort of service.

I know that up here in WA, Comcast has a COmcast Business setup, which offers around 8-10mpbs, and virtually uncapped upload, so that you can run business level data apps without choking your connection to a crawl.

But, like you said, not everyone is set up to handle that sort of service.

If you do not want to run a routing protocol, and believe me you don't/can't on ADSL... then you must load balance by sending every other outbound connection left or right, or have failover. Linksys makes a VPN router box that does either of these things, and also handles like 100 inbound/outbound IPSec connections. We almost deployed like 100 of them at a former job because they were so fucking handy and easy to use. They're not wireless, so they're cheap too. Pick one up.

There are routers called dual-wan routers, I have even seen quad-wan.... something like http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16833120005 will probably work for you, I have used them in the past the only thing you may have to watch out for (Unless they fixed them recently) was that you could never find one that worked in SSL (well) if you did hosting etc.